MINING: Mechanized Miner

The timing could hardly have been better.
Last week, in the second week of the coal strike, the Pittsburgh
Consolidation Coal Co. let it be known that it
had conducted successful experiments with a new machine which cuts,
crumbles and loads coal in one continuous operation. The machine
promised to revolutionize the mining industry, which is already highly
mechanized, and make mere button-pushers out of miners.

Mechanical miners that do all the work from coal seam to mine car are
nothing new. Mining engineers have been trying them with limited
success for years. But coal men cheered the vast improvements...